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CHAPTER SIX
I ARRIVED HOME, FEELING EXHAUSTED. Force of habit made me flick on the light in the hallway, even though the bulb had gone. We’d been meaning to replace it but kept forgetting.
I knew at once that Kathy wasn’t there. It was too quiet; she was incapable of quiet. She wasn’t noisy but her world was full of sound—talking on the phone, reciting lines, watching movies, singing, humming, listening to bands I’d never heard of. But now the flat was silent as a tomb. I called her name. Force of habit, again—or a guilty conscience, perhaps, wanting to make sure I was alone before I transgressed?
“Kathy?”
No reply.
I fumbled my way through the dark into the living room. I turned on the light.
The room leaped out at me in the way new furniture always does until you’re used to it: new
chairs, new cushions; new colors, reds and yellows, where there once had been black and white. A vase of pink lilies—Kathy’s favorite flowers—was on the table; their strong musky scent made the air thick and hard to breathe.
What time was it? Eight-thirty. Where was she? Rehearsal? She was in a new production of Othello at the RSC, and it wasn’t going particularly well. Endless rehearsals had been taking their toll. She seemed visibly tired, pale, thinner than usual, fighting a cold. “I’m so fucking sick all the time,” she said. “I’m exhausted.”
It was true; she’d come back from rehearsal later and later each night, looking terrible; she’d yawn and stumble straight into bed. So she probably wouldn’t be home for a couple of hours at the earliest. I decided to risk it.
I took the jar of weed from its hiding place and started rolling a joint.
I’d been smoking marijuana since university. I first encountered it during my first term, alone and friendless at a fresher party, too paralyzed with fear to initiate a conversation with any of the good- looking and confident young people around me. I was planning my escape when the girl standing next to me offered me something. I thought it was a cigarette until I smelled the spicy, pungent, curling black smoke. Too shy to refuse, I accepted it and brought the joint to my lips. It was badly rolled and coming unstuck, unraveling at the end. The tip was wet and stained red from her lipstick. It tasted different from a cigarette; it was richer, rawer, more exotic. I swallowed down the thick smoke and tried not to cough. Initially all I felt was a little light on my feet. Like sex, clearly more fuss was made over marijuana than it merited. Then—a minute or so later—something happened. Something incredible. It was like being drenched in an enormous wave of well-being. I felt safe, relaxed, totally at ease, silly and unself-conscious.
That was it. Before long I was smoking weed every day. It became my best friend, my inspiration, my solace. An endless ritual of rolling, licking, lighting. I would get stoned just from the rustling of rolling papers and the anticipation of the warm, intoxicating high.
All kinds of theories have been put forward about the origins of addiction. It could be genetic; it